DEAD AIR always did like Iowa!

Once again, listening to the ever-fabulous Frank On Friday...who gives me the courage to confront the right-wing bobbleheads running my state. Sometimes I wonder what he would say if he were still here. Frank Zappa, your country needs you.

Moving to Montana soon
Gonna be a dental floss tycoon

And speaking of Montana, Governor Brian Schweitzer has just caved in time and has accepted his state's stimulus funds.

That leaves us.

South Carolina. The first state to secede from the Union, sweet schoolchildren are frequently reminded!

(((fumes)))

Yes, our beleaguered state is still fucked, as previously written... the deadline for accepting the disputed $700 million is tonight, and Head Dick, Governor Mark Sanford, is still holding quite firm on not accepting it. A press conference/brawl ensues within mere minutes, down in Columbia, and as the infamous Texas Chainsaw Massacre trailer asked: Who will survive, and what will be left of them?

As Kia, commenting on my previous thread, stated: "Surely it's a sign of the apocalypse when Lindsey Graham is a voice of reason."

I couldn't have outlined the situation any better.

Frank, we need you man. Come back, come back...

~*~

I've been a busy little bee this week, but as always, managed to catch some interesting internetz action.

Lindsay Beyerstein attempts to discuss the very serious subject of clitorectomy in New York State and the laws pertaining (or not) to its continued practice:

According to one estimate, 41,000 women in New York are at risk of being cut, or have already been subjected to genital cutting. This estimate is based on data from the 2000 census, so clearly more up-to-date information is needed.

Female genital cutting can range in severity from a harmless ritual pinprick to the complete surgical removal of the external genitals. These procedures can cause acute and chronic infections, loss of sexual sensitivity, difficult labor, and PTSD.

According to a lawyer quoted in the article, no one has ever been charged under New York's anti-FGM statute or its federal equivalent since the laws were enacted in the mid-nineties. The last state-level FGM outreach program in New York took place a decade ago.

Scary stuff.

And of course, before you can say FORESKIN, various obnoxious males show up and hijack the thread: WHAT ABOUT MALE CIRCUMCISION?!

((((reads post back))))

Well, what about it? That was not the TOPIC, assholes. Guys were not the subject. I realize this is disorienting for you, since GUYS ARE ALWAYS THE DAMN SUBJECT. (Of course, if Lindsay had issued a "no guy zone" statement on the thread, they would undoubtedly start screeching about that, too.) Lindsay writes:

Can we ever have a discussion of FGM without the neonatal anti-circumcision crowd hijacking it? This has happened about four times already, and I'm getting sick of it. I'm sympathetic to your position, but folks, please don't commandeer every single thread about female genital cutting. Have some perspective, here. You're cheapening your own cause by hijacking FGM discussions.

Yes, there exist variants of FGM that are roughly anatomically analogous to neonatal hospital circumcision--but they are more like points in logical space than health concerns. The main, pressing, public health problem of FGM is analogous to removing the entire penises of male adolescents (and, sometimes, turning the whole bleeding, unsterile mess inside out and stitching it back together).

There are extremely active forums for you to discuss the evils of neonatal foreskin docking. Please take your concerns there.

And did they? Ha, are you kidding?

As if on cue, typhonblue, a well-known and tedious internet-obsessive on the topic of MALE circumcision, shows up and starts preaching and monopolizing the subject on behalf of the poor oppressed men. (Because you know, men are just more important than women, and don't you forget it.) Even after being politely asked NOT TO.

Some people just don't have any decency; their basic sense of overweening entitlement and abject rudeness just take over everything.

Lindsay is far nicer and much more tolerant than I am.... if any of you assholes show up hijacking HERE, I will eat you for a nice little snack (burp). And I am in a rather contentious mood and kinda hungry, with all this calorie restriction... so bring it, you unsuspecting penis-obsessed pseudo-trolls!

Yum, yum!

~*~

Longish thread at Astarte's Circus, titled Be the President or Marry the President, brings up fascinating questions about whether being a First Lady is something to aspire to, in and of itself. Admittedly, I am rather clueless concerning some of the comments. I don't think Octo was criticizing Michelle Obama, per se, but questioning the whole First Lady cult...of which I am also periodically critical. But check out the thread and comments and see what you think.

Can we criticize the "First Lady culture" without also criticizing the woman who is First Lady? This echoes several old (and unresolved) feminist questions: can we criticize the housewife cult, the Playboy Bunny cult, the supermodel cult, etc etc without criticizing women who have personally made these choices? How to criticize the male-dominant culture, without hurting or disrespecting women within that culture?

It is like we don't quite have the language for what we are trying to say, and what we seek to do...

~*~

And the GOOD NEWS:

The Iowa Supreme Court has just ruled in favor of same-sex marriage!

YES! Congratulations on your progressive politics, Hawkeyes! Alas, a blog, and Feministe are also presently discussing the ruling.

~*~

It's bloody embarrassing how many of my previous musical posts are missing their centerpiece. Warner Music Group, bad capitalists extraordinaire, have taken away so many of my YouTube presentations--they are as bad as WalMart for stealing neighborhood fun away.

Nonetheless, I plow onward... let's hope some brave tunes remain!

Meanwhile, here is the song I can't get off my mind/official earworm for this week, which also helpfully fits into our Hawk motif:

Jayhawks - Waiting for the sun (1992)

Evel Knievel 1938-2007

Robert Craig Knievel, Jr., aka Evel Knievel, has passed on. My mother adored him, and now he is gone, as indeed, she is also gone.

He was crazy, and everyone in the 70s loved him for it. This was back in the day, before everybody did weird things to get on TV. Evel Knievel was ahead of his time, and understood public relations. He would talk to anyone, any time. About himself, of course.

Knievel was a pole vaulter, hockey player, and insurance salesman, before getting into the motorcycle business. He was a bust as a salesman, but soon found his calling as a professional motorcycle-daredevil, jumping over a box of rattlesnakes, mountain lions, a cargo van, a speeding motorcycle, Greyhound buses, double decker-buses (in London) and cars. Lots and lots of cars. As a child, I watched with heart pounding as he smashed into the pavement, again and again, one of the famous filmed intros to ABC's WILD WORLD OF SPORTS.

One of his biggest disasters was his jump over the fountains at Caesars Palace, which made him ultra-mega-famous, but left him in a coma for 29 days. At some point, it seems he broke nearly every bone in his body, while doing daredevil jumps at $25,000 a clip. Going to see Evel in one of these shows was like going to see a rock star or a concert, and people lined up for the opportunity.

The Snake River Canyon jump was first conceived because the US Government would not allow Evel to jump over the Grand Canyon, which is a national park, after all. I recall conversations on late night TV, in which it was posited that he might jump from skyscraper to skyscraper (later seen in THE MATRIX), and it was thought he might actually be insane, but nobody cared. He broke a record selling tickets at the Houston Astrodome, as he also broke a record on February 28, 1971, jumping over 19 cars in Ontario, California.

Weirdscifi describes the Snake River Canyon jump:

Knievel hired former Navy engineer Bob Truax to build a rocket-powered Sky-Cycle. The Sky-Cycle cost over $150,000 and was unsuccessful in clearing the canyon in test runs. Despite this, Knievel decided to make the attempt.

“I didn’t think I even had a 50-50 chance to make it,” Knievel remembers. “Everyone told me not to do it, but I was determined to keep my word, so I climbed up and got strapped in. When I punched that power button I thought, ‘God, here I come.’”

The parachute of the Sky-Cycle deployed almost immediately after launching and Knievel fell to the riverbank hundreds of feet down in the canyon. He escaped with minor injuries.

He brawled, he drank, he got hepatitis, he filed for bankruptcy. He was sued by the state of Montana for back taxes. He was busted for soliciting an undercover policewoman, as well as possessing illegal firearms. He also played himself on The Bionic Woman and his likeness was made into a plastic toy action-figure for little boys across the USA.

Evel Knievel became a Christian earlier this year, and it is my prayer that he rest in peace. He was always big, it was the canyons that got small.

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Listening to: Red Hot Chili Peppers - Hollywood (Africa)
via FoxyTunes